Top WordPress Plugins!

These Top WordPress Plugins will keep your blog running smoothly!

Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything you can imagine. There are over 11,000 plugins which have been downloaded more than 112,480,400 times and counting.

One word of caution, with so many cool plugins to choose from be careful as to not overload your site, too many Plugins can slow down your sites load time. Which doesn’t sit well with Google and can actually impact your website rankings.

Here is a list of my 10 Top WordPress Plugins:

1. UP Smart Update Pinger

By default, WordPress will send out a “ping” each and every time you either make a new post, as well as making a simple update or correction. So if you’re like me, forever making changes, then you must own this free plugin.

By Far this is the Top WordPress Plugins Suggestion and here’s why.

When you Ping your site, it tells the search engines that you have fresh content and as as a result, they can scan your site for this new info. Over pinging is considered spam and can get your site banned. Although not a free plugin, it’s well worth the investment. You can download this Top WordPress Plugin here: http://ultimateplugins.com/smart-update-pinger/usage-instructions/

2. W3 Total Cache

This plugin will dramatically improve the speed and user experience of your site. Google loves sites that load up quickly and will actually punish you for a slow loading site.

3. SEO Pressor

This one vies for the Top WordPress Plugins spot because SEO is so important to getting ranked on the first page of Google.

This Top WordPress Plugin is one of the most effective ways of building backlinks to your site that I have found. Comments are one of the best things you can receive on your blog so why not give back to your readers and reward them for leaving a comment.

This plugin will fetch the feed at the commenters site URL as they type in their comment. It then extracts the last blog post title and shows a list of the last several posts they’ve done on their site. Giving them the option to choose which of the last several posts they would like to display. Their link is then displayed for everyone to see. This premium version has several other brand new features included.

This plugin will give you a list of any related posts or pages on your site and place it at the bottom of your most recent blog post. The more great content people are exposed to on your site, the greater chance they will find something else they like on your blog, causing them to stay longer, dig deeper into what you have to offer and ultimately lowering the “Bounce Rate” of your site. This free WordPress Plugin gives your readers access to content which they might not have otherwise seen.

6. All In One SEO Pack

In the eyes of many a blogger this is one of the Top WordPress Plugins not to be missed.

In many WordPress “Themes” this is a missing component and imperative to setting up SEO for your WordPress Site. With this plugin in you can list your Description (probably the most important SEO feature), Blog Title, and Keywords all in one convenient place.

7. Facebook Share & TweetMeme Retweet Buttons

You’ve seen these little buttons on thousands of sites, and for a good reason. One-Click access allowing your readers to share your content with all their Twitter and Facebook followers. How powerful is it when a reader can share your content with 20,000 or more of their followers at the click of a button on Twitter? Priceless…

8. Official Stat Counter – Free Real-Time Visitor Stats

This powerful WP Plugin gives you 29 ways to track your visitors stats. Complete with graphs, charts and information you can’t easily find using Google Analytics. Plus it’s right there in your Dashboard saving you time and the hassle of having to log into Google’s site. Don’t get me wrong, Google Analytics is a powerful tool and not to be overlooked. For me this is simpler way to keep track of my stats.

9. Thank Me Later

With this Top WordPress Plugin you can automatically seed a “thank-you” email to those who have commented on your blog. This plugin actually engages the visitor by reminding them to check back for responses or new blog posts. You have complete control and can configure your message anyway you like.

10. Akismet

Last but not least in my 10 Top WordPress Plugins list, Akismet will check all of the comments left on your site for spam. You will need an API Key to use it, which is free to obtain. Spammers just looking for a back-link to your site will be captured and placed in the spam section of your comments section. Giving you easy access and the ability to delete blocks of Spam comments at one time. To date, Akismet has detected over 4700 spam comments on my site.

So there you have it, my 10 Top WordPress Plugins that not only keep my blog running smoothly, but also have helped increase my website traffic by over 166%.

Please share these Top WordPress Plugins with all your friends on Twitter and FaceBook and be sure and leave a comment below, especially if you have some Top WordPress Plugins to add to the list.

Twitter: RhondaHolscherThanks so much Richard for sharing this list. I’m fairly new to WordPress, but I’m loving it and I’m constantly looking for any relative information to help me improve my site and my skills on WordPress. Really appreciate you taking the time to write this up.